This is from an article by Ralph Grabowski from his popular blog “upFront.eZine, Inside the Business of CAD”. Ralph has been around from the beginning of Autocad and instrumental in the expansion of CAD in the industry.
This article shows the disadvantage of subscription software.
upFront.eZine #1,137: Surviving the Recession, Should One Come
“The primary point of subscription payments is not to benefit customers, but to benefit shareholder-owned CAD vendors, who desperately need to show Wall Street predictable, smoothly upward trending profits. Privately-owned CAD vendors do not suffer from this flaw.”
“(The benefit of subscriptions to customers is that fees can be written off corporate income taxes 100% each year, unlike permanent licenses. As well, a level of support and automatic upgrades are typically included in the price. The drawback is that quicker support can cost more, and that upgrades can be lackluster, as CAD vendors no longer need to justify to customers the cost of upgrades, as in prior times.)”
I have been beating this drum for years. IronCAD has both rental and perpetual options. Sadly, the 3 high end products lock you into proprietary option which limit the flexibility of the operations. In the past engineering operated on standards. This has all but disappeared with the introduction of CAD software. There is no profit in standardizing the industry. It really is shocking that industry and academia has nor realized this.
The True Cost of Subscriptions!
“CAD subscription only, is a very bad business decision. It is like getting married to someone you can’t control and almost impossible to divorce after a few years.”
The industry has to move toward a more standardized system. It is costing the industry a fortune.
Standardization!!! The Future of 3D CAD!!
If you are interested in adding professional hybrid modeling capabilities or looking for a new solution to increase your productivity, take some time to download a fully functional 30 day evaluation and play with these packages. Feel free to give me a call if you have any questions or would like an on-line presentation.
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Joe Brouwer
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sales@tecnetinc.com
TECH-NET, INC 